I have been researching different types of adoptions for a couple of weeks and adopting from foster care is what I’m currently focusing on. Is there ever any healthy Caucasian 5-7 year olds available for adoption? I looked through lists of waiting children and didn’t see any. Can you choose the race of the children that are placed with you? Has anyone ever gone through this that is willing to share their experience?
I haven’t fostered to adopt, but I would think you could request? I’ve heard that in infancy adoption Caucasian girl babies are in the highest demand–of course, that’s a different process, but I would think you could request certain things for foster to adopt, as well? I had a cyber friend who was looking into foster-to-adopt, and when they entered the programme, they were asked if they had any stipulations–special needs children, ages, etc. So I would think you could request a certain age and nationality. I had another cyber “friend” (she ended up being a troll–long story!) who “fostered-to-adopt”, and while in the process she said she requested that the foster system only give her children with similar coloring, because she wanted them to feel like they fit into the family. Which sometimes I can’t tell if that’s sensitive and sensible, or downright appalling. If I adopted a child of another nationality, he or she would be just as much a part of my family as any biological child of mine would be. But I can understand wanting a Caucasian child–I’m mainly of European (English, Welsh, Irish, [name_m]German[/name_m], Swiss, [name_m]French[/name_m]) ancestry, so I feel like I would know how to deal with that best. I know how to take care of white people hair, haha. I know more about European stuff, because I’m interested in where I’m from. But if I adopted a Vietnamese child, I would learn all that stuff and help them appreciate where they’re from, and where they are now. If that makes sense.
I don’t know for sure, and I couldn’t guide you terribly much (I have refused to let myself look into adoption anything until I find a well-paying job that I could actually support myself and an adopted child, or until I marry, haha, because I know I’ll get too broody otherwise!), but from the process of other friends, I should think so?
Anyway, hopefully someone else will be more helpful. 
Good luck!
I’m no expert, just someone with a lot of adoption in my family, but white kids are adopted much more quickly because of higher demand. You would likely have to wait a while. Is it really important to have a white child? Transracial adoption is complicated, yes, but the bottom line is that all kids need parents.
It’s not that I have anything against other races I just can’t see myself with anything other then a white son. I can easily see myself with an [name_f]Asian[/name_f] daughter but there isn’t a large [name_f]Asian[/name_f] population in my area so I would most likely have to do an international adoption. I won’t be adopting any time soon but I recently found out I can’t have children so I am looking into my options for the future.
The problem is that Caucasian 5-7 year olds are the ones everyone wants! It sounds insensitive, but it’s sadly very true. I haven’t experienced adoption myself but my brother in law and his boyfriend have two adopted kids and it was a long hard struggle for them to get to where they are now. Theirs are siblings, both African-American and it took them years just to go through the first stages of adoption. I don’t think it matters about race but it really depends what you’re going to feel comfortable. You’ll probably have more luck trying to adopt siblings because there’s often more of them out there as it’s more of a challenge to take on, if it’s something you’d be willing to try. I hope I’ve helped!
PS I love your names in your signature!
You could specify to your social worker about the race you want your child to be and you would never have to foster a child you didn’t want. Although I don’t really understand your viewpoint, I hope it goes well for you if you adopt in the future
As a mother who did adopt transracially, I can’t say that I understand your reasoning here, but you can definitely specify the type of child you will accept in an adoption or foster placement. However, the foster agency is very likely to call you with children who are outside of your acceptable range- younger, older, different races, etc. They are just often hard up for foster homes for kids. I have a friend who is no longer fostering who still regularly gets calls asking her to take emergency placements.
More older children than babies/toddlers are in need of adoption placements through the state as well, so you might have some luck there b.c the age range you specified is older. Only a tiny fraction of children available for adoption are posted online. The courts don’t like to declare children legally free for adoption before someone is lined up to adopt them, this is why many available children are not online.
You can try going through an agency for this, if you want to be specific. Many adoption agencies have divisions that specifically deal with this. Their services are often free or very low cost. It sounds like you are more interested in ultimately adopting than in fostering multiple children, so you might want to contact an agency to help you find legally free children or children who will likely soon be legally free.
First of all I wanted to say how sorry I am that you have found out that you can’t have children. That has to be so hard. I won’t say I understand how you feel because that would be untrue but I have a couple close friends who have gone through infertility and I know it was heartbreaking for them. One thing that you might want to look into, as it sounds as though you are a few years away from trying to build your family, is fertility treatment. I don’t say this in anyway to discourage your wish to adopt if that is what you want to do but because a lot of people aren’t aware of how many options there are for fertility tx. Especially for financing such treatment. One of my friends was looking into egg donors and surrogates and realized that most American fertility clinics will let you finance the whole thing. So while $30,000(egg donor) and $100,000 (surrogate and egg donor) may seem like a lot, when it is paid for in monthly installments over a number of years it is much more manageable, in many cases not unlike a car payment. Many clinics also have refund guarantees so you only pay the full price if it results in a live birth. [name_m]Just[/name_m] food for thought when you are researching your options.
Secondly, I just wanted to support you in you choice of wanting to adopt a white child because so many people have been unbelievably rude in disrespecting this preference. I actually have the same preferences as you do, I would want a child the same color as I am and the only one that I might be able to see myself with who is not white would be an [name_f]Asian[/name_f] little girl. This is not racism, it is choosing a child you can see yourself parenting. [name_m]Just[/name_m] like people would have certain medical or emotional difficulties they could see themselves managing and others they couldn’t, it is trying to match yourself with a child that you could see yourself bonding with and caring for. When entering into such an important thing like adoption knowing what you can and can not manage and what child you could and could not envision yourself with should be encouraged not discouraged. The most horrible thing would be if you found yourself unable to bond with the child. [name_f]Do[/name_f] not let the politically correct police push you into a child you aren’t comfortable with.
I am Canadian so our foster care system is probably a bit different than yours but from my understanding you are absolutely allowed to say what type of child you could foster or adopt and which ones you couldn’t. This includes age, race, gender and medical or emotional difficulties. Social workers want placements to be successful, it is horrible for the child when they aren’t, so they would absolutely let you decide the parameters of a child that could be a part of your family. My best wishes to you during this difficult time.
I think your question has been answered but I’d like to apologise if I came across as unbelievably rude or disrespectful- that really wasn’t my intention. Good luck.
I don’t think it’s a matter of anyone being the PC police. I didn’t get that impression from any of the responses in this thread.
Roughly 60% of children in the American foster care system are not white. [name_m]Black[/name_m], Latino, and mixed race children (especially the boys) are hard to place because, quite frankly, very few people want them. It’s extremely sad, and I think that’s why previous posters mentioned it. [name_m]Young[/name_m], healthy white children are very hard to “get” because that’s the type of child most adoptive parents want. It doesn’t have anything to do with being PC. It’s just fact.
Since you’re interested in the 5-7 age range, I would highly recommend doing research on reactive attachment disorder.
Is there ever any healthy Caucasian 5-7 year olds available for adoption? Quite honestly, there are rarely ever ANY “healthy” children available for adoption. Most suffer from some sort of mental, emotional, physical, or learning impairment. Many children have some sort of delay in one of the areas because of some sort of neglect from their parents or caregivers.
Can you choose the race of the children that are placed with you? You can but you’d be on a long list. I just looked at my site’s “waiting children” photolisting and the second boy shown was a 6-year-old white boy with mild physical impairments and moderate emotional impairments. This kid is adorable, by the way! If I wasn’t adopting internationally, I’d have my home study be foster-to-adopt instead. The 5-year-old girl listed has severe physical, mental, and learning impairments as well as mild emotional impairments.
I didn’t see any of the responses as rude or disrespectful or PC-police like. I apologize if you saw mine that way. I certainly do not want anyone to adopt transracially if they feel that they cannot love that child as their own. [name_m]Just[/name_m] keep in mind that adopting an [name_f]Asian[/name_f] child would also be a transracial adoption and you would be dealing with the same issues.
You mentioned the possibility of adopting an [name_f]Asian[/name_f] girl- what about a boy? A [name_f]China[/name_f] Special Needs adoption for a boy is very quick- we have close friends who are currently doing this, it took them about three months to get a referral for a three year old boy with very mild needs and they will have him home in less than a year. Girls are a significantly longer wait, both in [name_f]China[/name_f] and in international adoptions in general. I have no idea why everyone wants girls rather than boys, but that is apparently the way that it is.
Tarynkay- I actually would prefer a boy but I can’t see myself with a boy of another race which I can tell you don’t understand. I know there are a lot of people that race doesn’t matter and that’s great I’m sorry if I offended you. I’m just being honest with myself.
The reason why I would become a foster parent first is because everywhere I have read has said that most younger healthy children are adopted by their foster parents.
Casilda- When I said healthy I meant no major medical problems like cerebral palsy and Down’s syndrome. I know a child in the foster care system will probably have emotional issues. Can I ask what country you’re adopting from?
Ajh- thank you so much for being supportive
@pemdas- You haven’t offended me, don’t worry. I really don’t get it, but I am glad that you are being honest with yourself and I really would never want anyone to be pressured into adopting a child they could not love completely.
I don’t know how long ago you found out that you could not have biological children. For me, when we found that out, my husband and I both definitely needed some time to mourn that loss of passing on our genes, having kids who looked like us, etc. Anyhow, like I said, I don’t know your story and maybe you have done this already, but giving ourselves time and space to grieve before pursuing adoption was really helpful.
You are right about the foster parents having the opportunity to adopt younger and healthier children. The catch is that foster placements only turn into adoptive placements about 25% of the time. So it can be a long road. The other thing is that the ethnicity of children available through foster-adopt varies greatly all over the country. We have cousins in rural [name_u]Indiana[/name_u] who have adopted three children through foster-adopt. I know that they never specified races as they have fostered children of different races before, but they ended up adopting three Caucasion toddlers through foster-adopt over the years.
I’m adopting from Eastern Europe. My daughter has Down Syndrome and I can tell you that she’s completely “healthy” (not all people with DS have the common health problems). There is no guarantee any child will be healthy, whether they’re adopted or biological.
If you’re referring to “healthy” in terms of mental capacity, again, there is no guarantee a bio child or even one adopted at birth won’t have some sort of learning disability.
I recently finished the training courses for becoming a foster/adoptive parent and am still in the process of becoming certified. The policies may differ where you live but I can provide some information on how foster/adoption works here. First, my state offers a dual certification program meaning that the same training courses and application process allows an adult/couple to simultaneously be approved as both a potential foster parent and potential adoptive parent. In the past, foster parents were not allowed to adopt the children they fostered but that regulation has ended and the dual certification process allows for an easier transition from fostering to adopting. In looking into the rules for foster/adoption in your State, dual certification might be a good thing to ask about first.
Another important point for consideration is that the federal regulations governing child protection mandate that when a child is taken into care, the goal must be reunification with their biological parents. There are some exceptions to that rule in extreme cases (i.e., another child in the home died as a result of abuse/neglect) but in the majority of cases, foster care is temporary and will not lead to adoption. My state allows a prospective foster/adoptive parent to indicate that you will only accept foster placements in cases where the child is at “legal risk” (or whatever the applicable term may be in your State). “Legal risk” means that the goal for that child has already moved from reunification with the birth parents to “permanence” for the child and that the State is petitioning for termination of parental rights so that the child will be freed for adoption. Once the child is free for adoption, other relatives will be given the first opportunity to adopt the child. If there are no interested and appropriate relative adoptions for the child, and the foster placement has been successful for at least 6 months, then the foster parents will be offered an opportunity to adopt. It generally takes another 6-12 months to finalize the adoption.
As applicants to the program, we were encouraged not only to indicate the age/gender/race of children we would accept but also the types of behaviors, developmental delays and health conditions we felt we could best support. They greatly emphasized the importance of matching parental resources with children’s needs. It is not considered in a child’s best interest to place them with parents who do not feel prepared to meet their needs, including the ability to support the child’s identity which encompasses the child’s race as well as things like their religion. I happen to live in a racially/culturally diverse metropolitan area where there are places of worship for all of the major world religions so race/ethnicity/religion are not factors that hinder me from being able to support a child. However, if I lived in a different community, I might feel less confident about my ability to support the identity of a child from a different race/religion. There is nothing wrong with that and in fact it is encouraged that parents honestly access their own abilities, resources and comfort levels in order to increase the chances of a successful placement.
If you haven’t already done so, take a look at the website for the agency governing child welfare in your State to see what information they offer about the process for becoming a foster/adoptive parent. They may provide orientation classes where you can get a lot of your questions answered before even applying for the training courses. Also, know that if you decide to start the process you are under no obligation to complete it. Find out what you can and if after a few classes you realize it is not for you, or perhaps just not the right timing, you can pull out of the program and it will not be held against you if you later decide to try again.